A bit of history

The name SignBox originated when I started my sign writing career at a Blomfield Signs in 1980; the days before computer generated signs.

Our first task as a new apprentice was to build our own sign box, which carried all of our equipment needed for creating signs, as well as being purpose built strong enough to sit or stand on.

The box was made of wood, at approximately 400 x 250 and 350 high and had a leather carry strap. The lid was hinged with a compartment which held our precious tools and 23 carat gold leaf with a special knife and pad.

The main part of the box had three removable trays. The top tray had pens, pencils, erasers, chinagraph pencils, charcoal and chalk. The second tray had watercolour brushes and the third tray had oil based brushes, with a small compartment of grease to keep the brushes in shape when they were not in use. The bottom compartment held the tins of paint we would use on the jobs, as well as a bottle of turps and a bottle of water for thinning paint and cleaning our brushes. The front panel of the sign box folded down to make a tray for our paints to sit on, this was hinged using long piano hinges. The corners of the sign box had metal 'suitcase corners' attached to help protect them from getting knocked about.

We each hand-painted our sign boxes in colours of our choice, to stand out from the other Signwriters, so we grabbed the right one when being dropped off at a job.​​​​​​​